The Living Wage Movement

The Living Wage Movement

In a
land of milk and honey, paradoxically, the ability for
families to meet their basic needs is becoming increasingly
difficult. The long-held notion that New Zealand is a
classless society where if you work hard, you can become
anything, is quickly being disassembled. Rogernomics,
capitalism and right wing politics have fostered division,
contributing to the establishment of an ever-growing class
of have-nots. Living Wage Aotearoa co-ordinator Annie Newman
says the question that they want to pose to people is,
“what kind of a community do they want to live in?” The
Living Wage Movement is about changing communities- a
healthy community is socially and fiscally beneficial for
all.

The Living Wage Movement is an international
demonstration which aims to connect community and faith
based groups to address poverty and inequality. The Living
Wage Movement Aotearoa shares the common goal of achieving a
living wage for New Zealanders. This is recognised as a
necessary step in reducing poverty and inequality. The
minimum living wage of $18.40 per hour before tax was set
with reference to a household construct of two adults and
two children, where one adult works 20 hours per week and
the other works 40 hours. Realistically, this figure varies
over the country, and this is a basic minimum for a family
to function and participate in their community. This figure
is not subject to fluctuations of rent or transport costs,
and Newman says that these issues “need to be addressed
by the government”.

The effects of low pay, and the
intensification of inequality, are intrinsically tied to New
Zealand’s poor placement in international statistics on
poverty and inequality. Despite one of National’s first
term policies in 2011 being to close the income and standard
of living gap between New Zealand and Australia, New
Zealand ranks 23rd out of the 34 countries in the
Organisation for Economic Development. Staggeringly, one in
six children are living in poverty. But these are not the
children of ‘dole bludgers'; 40% of these children are
coming from households where one or more parent is in paid
work or is self employed. Newman asks, “Where are the
people who are earning below that line getting money to
survive? Loan sharks? Family members?”

The struggle of
families to make ends meet is being recognised by big
businesses, whose acts of generosity tend to distract from
the fundamental problem. An example of this is the Fonterra
milk-in-school’s programme. Newman says, “feeding kids
at school is a bottom of the cliff mentality. We need to
challenge the structures that lead to poverty”.

In 2010
alone the richest 150 people grew their wealth by 20% while
wages moved by less than 2%. The top 1% of earners have more
wealth than the bottom 60%. The distance between the rich
and the poor is increasing at one of the fastest rates for
countries in the OECD, yet wages are not shifting (and have
not shifted in a long time) to meet the increased cost of
living.

Beyond the compelling statistical information,
Newman says that a catalyst of the Living Wage movement is
that in the current economic climate, people are desperate.
Even charities are struggling to provide for the growing
group of needy, she says “People are desperate. If we
don’t think about how we structure wages we are never
going to get out of poverty, nor give people a sense of
dignity.”

The growth of the ‘working poor’ is
fundamentally tied to a lack of access to education. The
ability to take on debt via a student loan is becoming a
luxury for a privileged few, as the choices young people can
make after school are limited to those that can bring in
money immediately. Newman says that “there is nothing
sitting behind these families.” Therefore, school leavers
are more inclined to enter the work force at entry level
over continuing education, or enter industries that provide
paid training, such as the trades or the police force.

Currently, the middle class bear the brunt of taxes, and
are therefore subsidising the damaging effects of low pay on
the community. A grassroots response to growing inequality
is manifesting itself in businesses adopting a Living Wage
policy. These include North East Valley Normal School in
Dunedin and Tonzu, a family run Tofu business in Henderson.
Tonzu has committed to providing a living wage for all
it’s staff, and says it will cost $600 per week to lift
everyone to $18.40 per hour. Tonzu says that they will find
the money by cutting wastage and other costs.

Research
shows that businesses who pay their staff more save money on
training and induction processes, as well as notice a
reduction of staff turnover, and absenteeism.

Since David
Cunliffe and Grant Robertson have declared their support for
the Living Wage, the movement is becoming a defining and
dividing factor in political discussion.

While most people agree that increased sugar consumption is a major cause of too many New Zealanders being overweight and obese, what we should do about this remains a matter of debate and argument. More>>

Safe to say that no-one, but no-one has had a better 2016 than Vladimir Putin. What an annus mirabilis it has been for him. Somehow, Russia got away with directly interfering in the US election process, such that a friendly oligarch is about to take up residence in the White House, rather than a genuine rival. More>>

ALSO:

We all supposedly agree that the media is going to hell in a tabloid handbasket, but the trends to the contrary can be a bit harder to spot. In his 1970s book The Right Stuff, Tom Wolfe had mocked the way the media instinctively acts as what he called The Victorian Gentleman. More>>

Fake news as reality; the inability to navigate the waters in which it swims; a weakness in succumbing to material best treated with a huge pinch of salt. That, we are told, is the new condition of the global information environment. More>>

Post-natal depression is a sly and cruel illness, described by one expert as ‘the thief that steals motherhood’, it creeps up on its victims, hiding behind the stress and exhaustion of being a new parent, catching many women unaware and unprepared. More>>

Here’s a somewhat scary headline from October 30 on Nate Silver’s 538 site, which summed up the statistical factors in play at that point: “The Cubs Have A Smaller Chance Of Winning Than Trump Does” More>>